Twilight’ finale does not disappoint

Sunday

Nov 18, 2012 at 6:00 AM

Family Filmgoer

“The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2” PG-13 — Teens in love with the books by Stephenie Meyer and the four preceding PG-13 films based on them (“Twilight,” 2008; “The Twilight Saga: New Moon,” 2009; “The Twilight Saga: Eclipse,” 2010; and “The Twilight Saga: “Breaking Dawn — Part 1,” 2011) will not be disappointed in this final finale. (The fourth book was made into two films.)

Bella (Kristen Stewart), new bride of vampire Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), has become a full-fledged vampire instead of a groupie. She’s now endowed with super-strength and senses, intensifying the steamy-dreamy but nongraphic sexual charge between her and Edward, which has fueled the entire series — teen longing versus chastity.

As the film opens, she wakes from a difficult pregnancy and childbirth. Her eyes are now vampire-red and she has a thirst for blood. Bella finally sees her baby, Renesmee. The infant is a human-vampire hybrid because Bella was human when she was conceived.

Renesmee grows very fast (played as an older child by Mackenzie Foy). Bella’s friend Jacob (Taylor Lautner), a werewolf, imprinted on Renesmee while Bella was unconscious. Bella fumes at that, but Edward makes her understand that Renesmee needs Jacob as a protector.

That becomes clear after a vampire from another covern mistakes Renesmee for an “immortal child” — a human child who has been turned into a vampire. That is a capital crime in the vampire world because immortal children can’t keep their vampire natures secret.

The Cullens call in vampire friends to testify on Renesmee’s behalf before the ruling Volturi Clan and their leader Aro (Michael Sheen). The confrontation could turn violent and destroy the Cullen Clan forever.

THE BOTTOM LINE: While bloodless, the battle scenes among vampires show heads torn off, and some of the immortal creatures set ablaze. A few werewolves who join the fight alongside the Cullens also get hurt or die bloodlessly. When one Cullen ally causes a huge crevasse to open on the battlefield, some vampires and werewolves fall to their deaths.

The sexual charge between Bella and Edward increases a bit in this film, as it has incrementally in every film. Because they are both vampires now, they can tear each other’s clothes off with comparable speed and super-strength. There is really only one bedroom scene, but it s stylized and nonexplicit. At other moments, the pair kiss passionately and joke nonexplicitly about the violence of their lust.

The newly transformed Bella, trying to sate her thirst for blood early in the film, nearly kills a deer, but a snarling mountain lion leaps into the frame. The camera cuts away, but one guesses the predator cat loses its life while the deer survives.

“Lincoln” PG-13 — Any fears that Steven Spielberg’s “Lincoln” would be a preachy epic will fall away for teens who see this masterful and extraordinarily entertaining movie.

As lucky flies on the wall early in 1865, we watch the president plot with Secretary of State William Seward (David Strathairn) to pass the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery. Lincoln wants the amendment to pass before the end of the Civil War and before his second inauguration. He wants it to be a done deal before he makes peace.

A trio of smarmy political operatives (James Spader, John Hawkes and Tim Blake Nelson) start courting recalcitrant House members with blatant offers of patronage. This unfolds alongside the Lincolns’ difficult but, as portrayed here, loving marriage.

Mary Todd Lincoln (wonderful Sally Field) has not recovered from the loss of their son Willie early in the first term. The president delights in their playful son Tad (Gulliver McGrath) and has strained relations with their grown son Robert (Joseph Gordon-Levitt).

The debates in the House are gripping, and Tommy Lee Jones steals scenes as the insult-hurling Abolitionist, Rep. Thaddeus Stevens. A couple of scenes seem stilted, but most of “Lincoln” is divine.

THE BOTTOM LINE: Three moments make “Lincoln” problematic for some middle-schoolers: One shows soldiers fighting intensely but nongraphically with bayonets; another depicts Lincoln riding through a battlefield and seeing endless bodies, at least one graphically gutted; and the third shows Lincoln’s son Robert observing a wheelbarrow full of severed limbs dumped near an army hospital.

Characters (though not Lincoln) smoke, drink and cuss. The N-word and other racial insults are often used. A marital fight between the Lincolns seems so real it is truly upsetting. They also discuss mental illness.

“The Sessions” R — The explicit sexuality in “The Sessions,” even though it is in no way pornographic, makes this a film only for those in their 20s and older.

Based on real events, and acted to understated perfection, it is the story of Mark O’Brien (John Hawkes), a poet and freelance journalist living in 1980s Berkeley, Calif. A victim of polio in childhood, Mark is paralyzed from the neck down and spends part of every day in an iron lung.

At age 38, he knows he won’t live to be old, and the one thing he longs for is to fall in love. Resigned to the idea that he may never have a romantic relationship, Mark hires Cheryl (Helen Hunt), a sexual “surrogate,” so he can at least learn how to have sex.

He asks his parish priest (William H. Macy) whether this would be a sin, and the priest decides God will give Mark a pass.

Even though Cheryl is married and keeps her private life private, she comes to care for Mark, and their sessions change both their lives. Writer/director Ben Lewin has a light touch and it works.THE BOTTOM LINE: The sex scenes between Mark and Cheryl are very explicit and include female nudity. Characters occasionally use strong profanity.